As more and more companies become part of the internet of things supply chain, the possibilities for business opportunities grow alongside the digital transformation. But with existing application traffic already straining beleaguered enterprise WANs, how do you avoid the data gridlock that is coming with the onslaught of IoT data?

Adding bandwidth or backhauling all internet traffic over a WAN to corporate data centers are two popular approaches. However, while they may be effective in the short term, they can create several challenges in the long term, including bottlenecks, latency issues, limited business agility and flexibility, and reduced quality of experience (QoE).

Here are three reasons that offloading internet traffic through intelligent traffic segmentation can free your business from IoT gridlock by enabling the shortest path from mobile, broadband and the internet to the edge.

Higher QoE = Lower latency, not just increased bandwidth

The limitations of current networking technology and certain immutable laws of physics do not allow latency-free transmission over long distances. So as exponential growth in traffic and data, as well as the use of cloud services, are placing extreme demands on bandwidth, how do you improve performance?

Strategically placed digital edge nodes act as a local interconnection hub for user, cloud and business traffic at the company’s digital edge. Businesses can bring users/traffic from field area networks into their edge node at the closest point, and then accelerate internet traffic through that edge node.

This allows companies to access local cloud and SaaS offerings directly and shift workloads to those services, resolving their last-mile challenges by offsetting MPLS circuits with high-capacity local Metro Ethernet circuits.

Securing the connection

In addition to providing a “fast pass” for users/traffic from field area networks into the edge node, performance hubs reduce the cyberthreat risk by establishing direct, secure connections via intra-colocations, extending a private LAN to business partners. This keeps the potential attack surface area small, and business traffic remains on private secure (and compliant) connections.

MPLS links to geographic locations are expensive and not sustainable with increasing demand for performance and data growth.

Cost efficiency in the cloud

As businesses become more digitally dependent, they are also more reliant on the public internet. Shifting traffic to the internet can be up to 10 times less expensive, but increases the potential risks in terms of reduced performance and QoE.

Shifting to high-capacity local Metro Ethernet circuits instead of more costly MPLS (T1) circuits allows businesses to take advantage of proximate, high-speed, low-latency connections for greater network optimization and global performance consistency at lower costs. This mitigates the need to move traffic over the internet via high-priced WAN links while still retaining businesses’ desired levels of control and security.

Localizing and optimizing the transfer of sensitive performance-hungry data traffic at the digital edge reduces costs and keeps that traffic on dedicated, private connectivity, where local security controls can be applied.

All IoT Agenda network contributors are responsible for the content and accuracy of their posts. Opinions are of the writers and do not necessarily convey the thoughts of IoT Agenda.

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